As millennials, it is our dream to work for ourselves and have no boss. For many of us, that means becoming “entrepreneurs.” Media outlets have made this profession famous over the last decade—and made it sound easy to achieve success.

Mr. J

A few weeks ago I was honored to present at the 2017 Institute for Financial Literacy in my hometown, Chicago, Illinois. My presentation, Doing what Works Best for Students, was a 101 lesson on how instructors, directors, and counselors teaching personal finance can develop their lesson using the Dick and Carey Model. The model begins with the needs assessment and favors a behaviorist approach.

As a personal finance educator, counselor, and blogger I change my style of teaching, content selection, and examples based on the student body. And as I mentioned during the presentation personal finance educators make the mistake of using the strategy to all students before analyzing the students. Not every student is going through the same personal finance issues, for example, a military veteran may be going through mortgage payment issues, divorce, daycare, and host of other matters while an 18-year-old freshman just wants enough money to pay for food and books.

What is great about the Dick and Carey model is that it analyzes the learner, helps in constructing the proper instructional strategies, understanding the student's contexts, and finally deciding what content to use in the classroom. Designing should not be cut and dry it needs to be fun and interactive. In personal finance we all have the same goal, assure individuals are financially literate, but it's how we get to the goal that will differ.

The Dick and Carey Model is just one of the many instructional design models to use, and it may not be the one for your needs. But you should use some design model as a planning guide.